Brexit has also spoilt my theatre-going. It has forced me to watch Rufus Norris’s execrable My Country; A Work in Progress(National, 2017). Unforgivable. Brexit has means that any new play is suddenly all about only one thing. So I can’t watch Stephen Laughton’s Screens(Theatre 503, 2016), Mike Bartlett’s Albion(Almeida, 2017) or Barney Norris’s Nightfall (Bridge, 2018) without listening for mentions of Brexit-related dialogues. But these plays are about so much more. Even plays that were staged before June 2016 — Martin McDonagh’s Hangmen (Royal Court, 2015) or Stef Smith’s Human Animals(Royal Court, 2016) — now seems to be about Brexit. And as for revivals of the 1980s plays about the Northern working class — such as Jim Cartwright’s Roador Andrea Dunbar’s Rita, Sue and Bob Too — yep, they are all about Brexit. I’ve avoided Chris Bryant’s Brexit the Musical, staged by Strong and Stable Productions, which ran at Edinburgh in August 2017, but Brexit has spoilt even revivals of old classics: William Congreve’s The Way of the World or George Bernard Shaw’s Saint Joan. After June 2016, even these plays are about Brexit. Aargh. And as for the Greek tragedies, let’s not go there. Brexit has even made me read Bertolt Brecht again: “In the dark times/ Will there also be singing?/ Yes, there will also be singing./ About the dark times.”

Yes, I really think that Brexit has ruined my life. And it’s not over yet…

Brexit plays can be seen at various venues all over the country, probably for ever.

This article appeared in Aleks Sierz on October 1, 2019, and has been reposted with permission.

This post was written by the author in their personal capacity.The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not reflect the view of The Theatre Times, their staff or collaborators.